Neutral Actors in History

Pascal Lottaz is Assistant Professor for Neutrality Studies at the Waseda Institute for Advanced Study, Kyoto University, Japan, where he researches neutral actors in international relations. He heads the research network neutralitystudies.com, which organizes regular academic conferences and publications. He has published 4 edited volumes and a monograph on neutrality.Eric Golson is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Surrey, UK. He has co-authored three books on historical cases of economic warfare, small states and neutrality.Hillary Briffa is a Senior Lecturer in National Security Studies and Assistant Director for the Centre for Defence Studies at King’s College London, UK. She has published extensively on small state neutrality, particularly the neutrality of small European states such as Malta.Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom defended his PhD thesis at the University of Cambridge where he researched contemporary military and diplomatic history. Habtom has been a guest researcher at the Swedish Defence University, Université Libre de Bruxelle, and Stockholm University, and the University of Luxembourg.

“A very necessary book about how small and middle states cannot avoid choosing between equally dangerous options, paraphrasing Kierkegaard’s ‘Either/Or’: Align with a great power, and you will regret it as you lose your sovereignty; don’t align yourself, you will also regret it as you sail into unpredictable whirlpools, depending on international law and the restraint of predatory powers to survive. But this book offers some tragic optimism for small and middle states: diversify your economic, security and political ties with as many different countries as possible.”

• Table of Contents Preface by the EditorsForeword by Ambassador Jargalsaikhan Enkhsaikhan Introduction: The Craft of staying out of other People’s Wars, Hillary Briffa and Naman Karl-Thomas HabtomThe Long Nineteenth Century1. Federalist Foreign Policy and Nonalignment in the Early United States, Christopher Mott2. Hawaiian Neutrality from the Nineteenth Century to the Present, David Keanu Sai3. Portuguese neutrality (1850-1939): Concepts, Contexts, Purposes and Geopolitical Consequences, Teresa Nunes, Frederico Benvinda and Soraia Milene Carvalho4. Neutral Luxembourg: The Struggle for Legitimacy and Agency, Eric KettmannThe Long Twentieth Century5. US Neutrality in First World War: The Power and Influence of Political Expediency, Christopher Hurley6. Irish Neutrality from the Sacred to the Profane: War, Politics and Pragmatism 1939-73, Mervyn O’Driscoll7. Neutrality or Nonalignment? The Cold War Origins of Indonesia’s Foreign Policy, Ristian Atriandi Supriyanto8. European Nuclear Disarmament (END) and its Neutralism during the Cold War of the 1980s,Timeo Antognini9. Josip Broz Tito: Architect of Nonalignment and Neutrality in Cold War Yugoslavia, Alek Barovic10. Switzerland: The Influence of Wars in Europe on Attitudes towards Neutrality and Forms of Autonomy, Thomas Ferst and Tibor Szvircsev Tresch11. Swiss Neutrality After the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, Jean-Marc Rickli and Thomas GremingerEpilogue, Hillary Briffa